[Editor’s Note: We were off for the holiday weekend, but I wrote a Cold Start for fun on Sunday. Hence the back-to-back cold starts. -DT] Look at that – it clearly says “Le Car” and it’s not really French, since that would be “Le Voiture.”
They seem to be using “Le Car” in that bus ad for some specific reason; is “car” in this context in French referring to a large bus? I’m not sure, and trying to Google that proves to be a nightmare.
Besides, I’m much happier telling people that the first Le Car sat 35 people. It just sounds more fun. It was definitely tinny and unsafe-feeling, but the retracting canvas top was pretty spiffy and the whole package had a great go-cart kinda mojo. I mean as long as you weren’t on the highway. Then it was just scary. Ah, Le Car… What you may not know is that the Le Car is responsible for the pen name of the Jack Reacher author, Lee Child (aka – Jim Grant): He’s also a bit of an auto enthusiast: Consumer Reports was impressed enough with its’ engineering, packaging and comfort to award the wagon first place in an 6-way comparison test in ’72, despite the fact the test car threw a rod(!) https://www.curbsideclassic.com/vintage-reviews/vintage-review-1972-dodge-colt-and-toyota-corolla-1600-wagons/ That’s the theory. Growing up, all buses and coaches were “cars” to me and I only started using “bus” when I went to Paris for university. The confusion was probably caused by the long-running (1964-1993) SAVIEM (Renault after 1977) S 45/S 53/S 105. My city used the urban bus variants while school field trips used the coach version. My LeCar is still going strong with over 160,000 miles on it. It’s excellent in town, and it can do 80 mph on highways as long as you like. It does slow down on steep uphills. Not sure how well it would do in really high temperatures either, but with no A/C the driver wouldn’t do so well either. https://www.bnyscar.fr/youngtimers/supercinq-tse/ In French, a bus or autobus is used for local transportation. Un car or autocar is used for coaches. Le car 35 place means a 35 seater coach, so the joke kills itself pretty quick there. As an other commenter mentioned, a car is feminine gender in French, therefore it should be “la” voiture. Sorry for this typical display of French pedantry, I’ll go back to my corner and shut up. Take care and have a nice day!
